I'am an undergrade history major. Then I did the MBA. Nobody in my mba class was close too me when it came to analysis, redaction or general preparation for presentation. I think that's where my history background shine the most. Today, i'm a director for a software business. No link whatsoever with my studies. I think it really depends on the type of employer you meet and if he's able to see beyond a degree. Analysis capacity is I think one of the most important thing for a job and we history undergrade become beast in that field. Just need to know how to sell it after college.

I’m a teacher and history major myself, although I’ve only taught SPED my whole career.

Lot of great answers here. One I’ll add that is somewhat cliche for wayward history majors, but still viable and worthwhile, is becoming a lawyer. The strong research and writing skills you have as a history major go hand in hand with the law. Historians are trained to craft arguments based on research, which is what lawyers do as well. Contract law, patent law (especially for niche industries), financial law, family law, maritime law, international law, labor law, education law…there’s so many avenues based on what interests you. Some lawyers never even set foot in a courtroom, and spend all their time writing briefs. You can work in the public or private sector, for non-profits at home or NGOs overseas. Obviously cost and time (mostly cost) are limiting factors, but there are a lot of scholarships and grants available based on socioeconomic, racial/ethnic, or other personal backgrounds. Also, in some parts of the country there is a glut of lawyers because a lot of people over the last 15-20 years earned law degrees as a backup plan, so depending on where you live (or want to live) it might be hard to find a job. I have one semester od law school under my belt, but had to give it up and so I went back to teaching. I guess I just want to live vicariously through you! Good luck to you!

There's a job field in software/tech called "customer success" where they often hire ex-teachers. It's like a higher level evolution of support for business accounts where you understand what the client is hoping to achieve with your software and help them achieve that through education, consulting and sharing insights back to the product developers. In many companies you don't need a technical background to do it, my only higher qualification is a history and politics/IR undergrad degree.

It's a great foundation if you can complement it with another field, like journalism or art history. I switched to the latter and ended up working in museums, on the curatorial side. It's not just that knowing the historical context helps (though, of course, it does); I found it very useful when it comes to studying a group of works and drawing conclusions, which is where those analytical and synthesis skills you mentioned come into play.

There are many careers you can build with your degree. With the skillset you mentioned you could go in to tech writing, QA, several different types of analytics, marketing, SaaS, corporate management, corporate training, Human Resources/training, project management... You could also get jobs in instructional design or a job in learning management software. These are all super generic terms that could fit just about any industry and you really just need to start looking for these types of things in industries that you like.

Your skills work very well as management for companies where tech employees need to interact with non-tech employees. Being able to analyze, write, and speak clearly are really huge assets in most medium to large businesses. Head over to LinkedIn and start looking at different companies you might like to work for and you'll start see that you fit a lot of what they need. History degrees translate well into many industries.

Good luck!

You mean just with an undergrad degree? I don't think there will be a ton of directly history-related jobs available to you (aside from maybe some entry-level government stuff, keep an eye on USA Jobs), but I guess you could apply those skills elsewhere. I have a non-teaching history job but I'm still more or less an academic, so I don't know how much advice I have for the truly non-academic world. Government could be a route to consider though, especially if you're willing to move around the country a bit.

First piece of advice is that the word 'best' is completely subjective. Search for what's best for you, not what other people think is best. I'm an historian for the government and I work at a museum. I will also say that it is a difficult field to break into without grad level education, though. For entry level... public service, non-profits, local and federal government, museums, archives, and historical societies are all options. You just have to look for something that you personally think sounds awesome and see if you're qualifications meet the position requirements. It's a pretty crowded field. Good luck.